I get "Authorization has been denied for this request." error message when using OWIN oAuth middleware (with separate Auth and Resource Server)

Question

I am attempting to decouple my auth and resource server. I am following the example provided in this tutorial:

http://bitoftech.net/2014/09/24/decouple-owin-authorization-server-resource-server-oauth-2-0-web-api/

This is the code in my Startup.cs in my auth server:

using Microsoft.Owin;
using Microsoft.Owin.Security.OAuth;
using Owin;
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Web;

namespace AuthServer.Web
{
   public class Startup
   {
      public void Configuration(IAppBuilder app) {
         ConfigureOAuth(app);
      }

      public void ConfigureOAuth(IAppBuilder app)
      {
         OAuthAuthorizationServerOptions OAuthServerOptions = new OAuthAuthorizationServerOptions()
         {
            AllowInsecureHttp = true,
            TokenEndpointPath = new PathString("/token"),
            AccessTokenExpireTimeSpan = TimeSpan.FromDays(1),
            Provider = new SimpleAuthorizationServerProvider()
         };

         // Token Generation
         app.UseOAuthAuthorizationServer(OAuthServerOptions);
         app.UseOAuthBearerAuthentication(new OAuthBearerAuthenticationOptions());

      }
   }
}

This is the startup.cs in my resource server (i.e. my sample Web api application):

using Microsoft.Owin.Security.OAuth;
using Owin;
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Web;

namespace AuthTestApi.Web
{
   public class Startup
   {
      public void Configuration(IAppBuilder app)
      {
         app.UseOAuthBearerAuthentication(new OAuthBearerAuthenticationOptions());
         app.UseCors(Microsoft.Owin.Cors.CorsOptions.AllowAll);
      }      
   }
}

When I post the following request to the "\token" endpoint of my auth server I sucessfully receive a token:

{
access_token: "PszrzJUtQUhX42GMryWjZiVHuKiJ9yCVH_1tZURumtC5mTj2tpuRDF3tXcN_VNIYuXY40IG0K7W3KASfJ9DlNIU2jMOkL2U5oEAXLNRRQuNYdEJ7dMPb14nW19JIaM4BMk00xfQ8MFRw0p6-uoh0-e-Q6iAiTwDNN3F7bYMF9qm874qhLWEcOt6dWQgwpdDUVPDi7F07-Ck0zAs48Dg5w4q93vDpFaQMrziJg9aaxN8",
token_type: "bearer",
expires_in: 86399
}

When I post the following request to my controller I receive the "Authorization has been denied for this request" error message?

GET /api/Test HTTP/1.1
Host: localhost:63305
Accept: application/json
Content-Type: application/json
Authorization: Bearer PszrzJUtQUhX42GMryWjZiVHuKiJ9yCVH_1tZURumtC5mTj2tpuRDF3tXcN_VNIYuXY40IG0K7W3KASfJ9DlNIU2jMOkL2U5oEAXLNRRQuNYdEJ7dMPb14nW19JIaM4BMk00xfQ8MFRw0p6-uoh0-e-Q6iAiTwDNN3F7bYMF9qm874qhLWEcOt6dWQgwpdDUVPDi7F07-Ck0zAs48Dg5w4q93vDpFaQMrziJg9aaxN8
Cache-Control: no-cache
Postman-Token: aeca8515-70b1-ef2c-f317-bf66136dccab

My auth server and resource / web api projects are in different solutions and are running on different ports (...not sure if that matters but thought Id mention it).

At this point these 2 projects are making use of oAuth OWIN middleware (and has very little custom code). The middleware is blackbox somewhat and just need some assistance in figuring out why I am receiving this error message.

Also note that the I am running both servers in two Visual Studio 2013 Web application projects that are in different VS 2013 solutions that are running on different ports. I am not sure if that matters but thought I would mention it.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

I just came across the same problem and found the solution:

You need to register the OAuth Token Generator and OAuth Token Consumer things before WebAPI is registered.

Kind of makes sense if you think of this as a pipeline, where Authentication/Authorization should come before any request handling by the controllers.

TL;DR: Change

appBuilder.UseWebApi(config);

this.ConfigureOAuthTokenGenerator(appBuilder);
this.ConfigureOAuthConsumer(appBuilder);

To

this.ConfigureOAuthTokenGenerator(appBuilder);
this.ConfigureOAuthConsumer(appBuilder);

appBuilder.UseWebApi(config);